Using experimental gaming simulations to elicit risk mitigation behavioral strategies for agricultural disease management

Authors

Eric M. Clark, University of Vermont
Scott C. Merrill, University of Vermont
Luke Trinity, University of Vermont
Gabriela Bucini, University of Vermont
Nicholas Cheney, University of Vermont
Ollin Langle-Chimal, University of Vermont
Trisha Shrum, University of Vermont
Christopher Koliba, University of Vermont
Asim Zia, University of Vermont
Julia M. Smith, University of Vermont

Document Type

Article

Publication Date

1-1-2020

Abstract

Failing to mitigate propagation of disease spread can result in dire economic consequences for agricultural networks. Pathogens like Porcine Epidemic Diarrhea virus, can quickly spread among producers. Biosecurity is designed to prevent infection transmission. When considering biosecurity investments, management must balance the cost of protection versus the consequences of contracting an infection. Thus, an examination of the decision making processes associated with investment in biosecurity is important for enhancing system wide biosecurity. Data gathered from experimental gaming simulations can provide insights into behavioral strategies and inform the development of decision support systems. We created an online digital experiment to simulate outbreak scenarios among swine production supply chains, where participants were tasked with making biosecurity investment decisions. In Experiment One, we quantified the risk associated with each participant's decisions and delineated three dominant categories of risk attitudes: risk averse, risk tolerant, and opportunistic. Each risk class exhibited unique approaches in reaction to risk and disease information. We also tested how information uncertainty affects risk aversion, by varying the amount of visibility of the infection as well as the amount of biosecurity implemented across the system. We found evidence that more visibility in the number of infected sites increases risk averse behaviors, while more visibility in the amount of neighboring biosecurity increased risk taking behaviors. In Experiment Two, we were surprised to find no evidence for differences in behavior of livestock specialists compared to Amazon Mechanical Turk participants. Our findings provide support for using experimental gaming simulations to study how risk communication affects behavior, which can provide insights towards more effective messaging strategies.

Creative Commons License

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

Rights Information

© 2020 Clark et al.

Recommended Citation

Clark EM, Merrill SC, Trinity L, Bucini G, Cheney N, Langle-Chimal O, Shrum T, Koliba C, Zia A, Smith JM. Using experimental gaming simulations to elicit risk mitigation behavioral strategies for agricultural disease management. PloS one. 2020 Mar 17;15(3):e0228983.

DOI

10.1371/journal.pone.0228983